Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1887-06-08

1
60 for God and my country" If foreign
foe shonld ever come all sectional animosi
ties would be obliterated. Here go oul
regiments into battle, side by side, Fifteenth
New York Volunteers, Tenth Alabama Cav
alry. Fourteenth Pennsylvania Rif1e-mer
Tenth Massachusetts Artillery, Seventh
lSouth Carolina Sharp Shooters. I have
no faith in the cry: 'sNo North, no South,
no East, no West" Let all four sections
keep their peculiarities and their prefer
ences, each doing its own work and moi
Interfering with each other, each of the
four carrying it's part in the great harmony
the bass, the alto, the tenor, the soprano
in the grand march of the Union.
/ congratulate you, the officers and SOL
diers of this national encampment, that if a
foreign attack should at any time be made
you would be ready, and there would be
millions of the drilled men of North and
South, like the men of my first text, which
could keep rank, and like the men of my
second text, that would not miss hair
breadth.
At this national drill, when thirty-one
States of the Union are represented, and
between the decorations of the graves of
the southern dead, which took place few
days ago, and the decorations of the graves
of the northern dead, which shall take place
tomorrow, would stir the Christian, pa
triotism and gratitude not only of this SOL
diery here present, but of all the people, by
putting before them the difference between
| these times, when the soldiers of all sec
tions meet in peace, and the times when
they met in contest. Contrast the feeling
of sectional bitterness in 1869 with the feel
ing of sectional unity in 1887. At the first
date the South had banished the national
air, ''The Star Spangled Banner" and the
North had banished the popular air of
ssWay Down South in Dixie" The north
ern people were "mudsills'' and the south
ern people were "white trash" The more
southern people were killed in battle the
better the North liked it. The more moth
ern people were killed in battle the better
the South liked it. For four years the head
of Abraham Lincoln or Jefferson Davis
would have been worth a million dollars, if
delivered on either side the line. No need
now, standing in our pulpits and platforms,
of saying that the North and South did not
hate each other. To estimate how very
dearly they loved each other, count up the
bombshells that were hurled, and the car
bineS that were loaded and the cavalry
horses that were mounted. North and
South facing each other all armed, in the
attempt TO kill. The two sections not only
marshaled all their earthly hostilities, but
tried to reach up and get hold of the sword
of'heaven, and the prayer of the northern
and southern pulpits gave more informa-
tion to the heavens about the best mode of
settling this trouble than was ever used
For four years both sides tried to get hold
of the Lords thunderbolts, but could not
quite reach them. At the breaking out of
the war we had not for months heard of my
dear uncle, Samuel J. Talmage, president
of the Oglethorpe University, in Georgia.
| He was about the grandest man I ever
knew, and as good as could be. The first
we heard of him was his opening prayer in
the Confederate Congress in Richmond,
which was reported in the New York pa
pers; which prayer, if answered, would to
say the least, have left all his northern rel
atives in very uncomfortable circumstan-
ces. The ministry at the North prayed one
way, and the ministry at the South prayed
the other way. No use in hiding the fact
that the North and the South cursed each
other with a whitening and all-consuming
curse
Beside that antipathy of war time place
| the complete accord of this time. Not long
ago a meeting in New Yerk was held to
raise money to build home at Richmond
for crippled Confederate soldiers, the meet
| ing presided over by man who lost an
arm and leg in fighting ON the northern
side, and the leg not lost so hurt that it
| does not amount to much. The Cotton
! Exhibition held not long ago at Atlanta
was attended by tens of thousands of north
ern people, and by Gen. Sherman, who was
greeted with kindness, as though they had
never seen him before. At the New Or
| EvhI ho1I
northern State was represented. A thou
sand-fold kindlier feeling after the war
than before the war. No more use of gun
powder in this country, except for rifle
practice, or Fourth of July pyrotechnics, or
shot at a roebuck in the Adirondacks.-
Brigadier- Generals in the Southern Con-
federacy making their fortunes as lawyers
in the northern cities. Rivers of Georgia,
Alabama and North Carolina turning mills
of New England capitalists. The old lions
of war-FOrts Sumter, and Moultrie, and
Lafayette, and Pickens, and Hamilton,
sound asleep on their iron paws, and in
stead of raising money to keep enemies ont
of our New York harboT, raising money for
the Bartholdi statue on Bedloe's Island,
figure of Liberty with uplifted torch to
| light the way to all who want to come in.
Instead of war antipathies, when you could
not cross the line between the contestants
without fighting your way with keen steel
or getting through by passes carefully scru.
tinized at every step by bayonets, you need
only railroad ticket from New York to
Charleston or New Orleans to go clear
through, and there is no use for any weapon
sharper Or stronger than steel pen. Since
the years of time began their roll has there
ever been in about two decades such an
| ,ocfnr hat k1o
war time of complete bitterness and this
time of complete sympathy
Contrast also the domestic life of those
times with the domestic life of these times.
Many of you were either leaving home or
far away from it, communicating by uncer-
tain letter. Whata morning that was when
you left home Father and mother crying,
sisters crying, you smiling outside but cry
ing inside. Everybody nervous and excited
Boys of the blue and gray whether you
started from the banks of the Hudson, or
the Savannah, or the Androscoggin, don't
you remember the scenes at the front door,
at the rail car window, on the steamboat
landing? The huzza could not drown out
the suppressed sadness. Don't you remem-
Der those charges to write home often,s and
take good care of yourself, be good boys,
and the goodbye kiss which they thought,
and you thought, might be forever? Then
the homesickness as you paced the river
bank on a starlight night on picket duty,
and the sly tears which you wiped off when
you heard group at the campfire singing
the plantation song about the old folks at
home. The dinner of hard tack on Thanks
giving Day, and the Christmas without
any presents, and the long nights in the
hospital so different from the sickness when
you were at home with mother and sister
at the bedside and the clock in tho hall
giving the exact moment for the medicine
and that forced march when your legs
ached, and your head ached, and your
wounds ached, and more than all your
heart ached. Homesickness which had in
it a suffocation and a pang worse than
death. You never got hardened as did the
guardsman in the Crimean war who heart
lessly wrote home to his mother 81 do not
want to see any more crying letters come
Ito the Crimea from you. Those have re-
ceived l put into my rifle after loading it,
and have fred them at the Russians, be-